You live in the UK, think Harrier. This is not one of those but that's how a plane lands vertically.

Also a crash can be considered a vertical landing.

Last edited by zepherin on Tue May 31, 2011 4:33 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Some Russian capsules (most/all?) land vertically with retro rockets, as opposed to the ocean landings used by the US program.

Anyway, regarding Skylon, a reusable airplane-type spaceship (especially a single stage to orbit one) has to be able to deal with a much smaller fuel fraction than a traditional rocket. As mentioned in the article, using atmospheric oxygen should help a lot, and using modern composites should help bring down the mass of the vehicle. It just remains to be seen how well it will perform, and if it can beat traditional rockets on payload cost.

On a technical note, the use of hydrogen for fuel implies that weight is a bigger concern than the greater technical issues it raises. Though the high heat capacity and speed of sound of hydrogen probably helps with the engine precooling section mentioned.

Yeah, but hydrogen engines are harder to build than ones that burn liquid hydrocarbons (because, e.g. of more extreme pressure and temperature requirements and the ability of hydrogen to happily penetrate merely airtight seals). Only the upper stages of the Saturn V used hydrogen, and the Soviet equivalent didn't use hydrogen main engines at all. Hydrogen use is not universal in modern rockets, despite everyone wanting them to lift as much as they can. Despite the challenges, hydrogen offers weight savings, so apparently the Skylon people think it's worth it.